The present invention relates to distribution of information either through broadcasting transmission over a local or wide area network, e.g., the Internet, or using cable video systems. More particularly, the invention provides a technique, including a method and apparatus, for scheduling distribution of video/audio information so as to maximize viewer ship of the same and, therefore, profits.
High speed networking and mass storage technologies have made possible interactive communication networks which provide consumers with video/audio information. Broadcast, video-on-demand, pay-per view, cable and Internet services are some of the best known services for providing consumers with programming choices ranging from movies to interactive games. FIG. 1 shows the major components of a video on demand service. The video programs, such as movies, are typically stored in one of various formats at a central server 10. Subscribers 12 submits requests to the server 10 for particular programs over a communications network 14. The communications network 14 may use any transmission medium, e.g. commercial telephone, cable and satellite networks. Upon receiving a request, server 10 retrieves the video program from mass storage and delivers a data stream, corresponding to the frames of the movie, to the requesting subscriber via distribution network 14. The data stream is directed to a receiver possessed by the subscriber which converts the data stream into signals necessary for playback and viewing of the movie.
With conventional video-on-demand video distribution, a library of content for selection by the user and complete Video Motion Control (VMC) is provided. VMC features typically include functions such as pause, fast forward, forward scan, reverse and reverse scan. Additional enhancements made possible via digital VMC implementation could include scene and chapter searches, searches for specific content, content related shopping and research, and other database type functions. To that end, conventional video-on-demand, conventionally known as true video on demand, dedicates a single session or communication pathway between the viewer and his movie. The communication pathway typically consists of dedicated video streams from a recording medium, such as a disk, dedicated communications channels, switching infrastructure, local neighborhood nodes, and set top boxes, disposed proximate to the local neighborhood nodes.
The dedication of communication pathways limits the number of customers that may be serviced by a providers, thereby reducing the revenue that may be generated. The number of viewers that may receive a common stream of video information, and the components and subsystems needed to transmit the same, is limited to a single user. As a result, the prior art is replete with systems and methods of maximizing the revenue generated by a given bandwidth of transmission channels. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,758,257 to Hertz et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 5,734,720 to Salganicoff each discloses a system and a method for scheduling receipt of desired movies and other forms of data from a network which simultaneously distributes many sources of such data to many customers, as in a cable television system. Customer profiles are developed for the recipient describing how important certain characteristics of the broadcast video program, movie or other data are to each customer. From these profiles, an “agreement matrix” is calculated by comparing the recipient's profiles to the actual profiles of the characteristics of the available video programs, movies or other data.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,594,491 to Hodge et al., assigned to the assignee of the present invention, discloses a system and method for distributing video over ADSL telephone lines. To maximize usage of the bandwidth provided by a system storing the information to be distributed, Hodge et al. advocate implementing a Near-Video-On Demand (NVOD) protocol. The NVOD protocol maps a video program onto a disk-drive in an interleaved fashion so that the video program is divided into data packets having a plurality of frames with each pair of adjacent frames corresponding to a pair of frames in a viewing sequence displaced from one another by a predetermined number of frames. Mapping the video frames in this manner renders the system compatible with existing video distribution systems, while maximizing the number of users that may access any given program.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,172,413 to Bradley et al. describes, in pertinent part, use of a central electronic library to store and deliver high-demand entertainment programming to local community electronic libraries that channel the programming to subscribers.
Low-demand programming is stored and delivered directly from a local community electronic library located in an area in which there may be a special interest in the programming. In this manner, Bradley et al. maximize access capacity while minimizing investment cost.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,421,031 to De Bey describes, in pertinent part, a video-on-demand system in which a video program disposed on a non-volatile storage device in divided into a plurality of segments. The segments are transmitted to each subscriber as a redundant sequence. The sequence is transmitted in accordance with a scheduling algorithm that ensures all the video segments of the video program are received by the subscriber to enable continuous playback in real-time of the video program. In this manner, the segments typically correspond to a non-contiguous sequence of video frames. The receiver, possessed by the subscriber, includes a buffer having sufficient memory to store a sufficient amount of video segments to ensure the subscriber experiences real-time playback of the video program.
What is needed, however, is a system and method for maximizing the number of users that may share a common communication pathway of data.